The National Day of Prayer

Today, Thursday May 7, is the National Day of Prayer here in the United States. On this day Christians gather in numerous venues to lift up prayers on behalf of our nation and its leaders, and to ask for spiritual renewal for our nation and its churches. Following is a suggested prayer composed by Beth Moore, renowned bible teacher and 2009 NDP Honorary Chairperson.








Father in Heaven,

We lift our eyes toward your Throne,

where you reign in righteousness.



Your Word assures us that when Your

people cry out in sincerity and humility,

You will never turn a deaf hear to us.



We call upon you now, seeking Your

forgiveness and favor.



Look over this fevered landscape

and heal us, Lord.



Drop knees to the floor and raise eyes

to the sky, for we know where our help

comes from.



Unite these States again in devotion to

You, and blur every dividing line.



Do not give us over to our sins. Give us,

instead, over to passionate prayer that

moves your heart.



"May Your unfailing love rest upon us,

O Lord, even as we put our

hope in You."



In the name of our

Lord and Savior,

Amen


Pause and pray for our nation today. The sanctuary at our church, Ararat Baptist Church of Jackson, TN, is open all day for prayer. Visit the National Day of Prayer web site for more prayers, video, and webcasts from around the nation. You may also visit VoteSmart.gov for specific names of elected officials for which to pray.

Know Thine Enemy

Are you prepared for Sunday School? How much time and effort did you spend preparing? One of my favorite quotes from long ago, and I don't recall who uttered it, is "Modern Christianity is an inch deep and a mile wide." that is a poetic way of saying that most believers are shallow spiritually. And that is due to simple lack of preparation. Most do not want to invest the time and effort needed for spiritual growth. This malady affects leadership as well as learners.



There is a great new article on Lifeway.com by Dr. Tim Smith that deals with knowing our enemy's tactics and being prepared to oppose them. Dr. Tim Smith serves as the Team Leader and Consultant for Sunday School/Open Group Ministries of the Georgia Baptist Convention. Satan's battle plan involves preventing Sunday Schools from doing those things that will lead to great victories in their churches. The article is worth reading, digesting, and sharing. Read it here. I welcome your comments.

Newsweek Misinterprets the Bible to Support Homosexuality

Newsweek has moved from reporting on events to endorsing the liberal homosexual agenda. Their cover story is an article by their religion editor that twists and misinterprets the bible to support homosexual behavior and destroy traditional marriage.

The article can be found online here and is a highly sophisticated piece of misinformation utilizing carefully chosen sources that agree totally with the author. It leaves no room, indeed does not even invite to the discussion, conservative bible scholars to refute the author's patently ridiculous assertions from holy scripture. Dr. Al Mohler, President of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, offers a good rebuttal here.

For the honest reader who wants to investigate how the bible does provide the perfect blueprint for marriage, I suggest The Love Dare from Broadman & Holman Publishers, a companion book to the recent movie Fireproof. One man and one woman for life is God's perfect design for the home and marriage, and the bible offers the perfect blueprint to attain the greatest possible satisfaction from this relationship.

Serve Others

A friend sent me the link to a great video that illustrates the powerful impact of service to others from the heart. What if our churches served in simple ways from the heart like the young man in this video?

Be sure to watch it at http://www.stservicemovie.com/.

Learning From Another....About Learning From Each Other

Dr. Ed Stetzer over at Lifeway.com has written a great post on his blog concerning balance. It is titled "Learning from Each Other-- Theologically Preoccupied and Evangelistically Fixated". The blog is a partial excerpt of an article written for Outreach Magazine. In it he proposes that instead of haranguing each other over our differences, churches and bloggers learn from each other's strengths. We all need to be theologically accurate and evangelistically active, not either-or. The recurrent sniping at one another breeds no benefit and wreaks havoc to our mission of reaching souls for Christ and making disciples.



I agree with Dr. Stetzer that we shouold be students of Scripture AND methodology. Scripture is always the same; methods can and should change to reach a changing culture. As long as our methods do not contradict Scripture, lets do what works! We are too quick to take verbal shots at a large church for being innovative; but we are just as quick to be critical of a smaller church for not being a larger church. There are sooo many factors that contribute to growing a church; how can we saddle and ride just one or two? Who is to say that the pastor of a smaller church is not as innovative, evangelistic, and faithful as a Rick Warren, Bill Hybels, or Tom McCoy? To grow some churches is the work of a lifetime, as one deals with people, the church's history, the community, and the changing American cultural landscape. It may take the contributions of several pastors over a generation to overcome barriers and grow a body of people to the glory of God. Should we not seek to be encouraging and prayerful to all who are doing God's work faithfully?



I close this post with a quote from Dr. Stetzer's post:

"I have been saying it for years, and I don't mind saying it again; we need to be both biblically faithful in doctrine and practice, and missiologically sound in our approach to people and cultures. I believe many of us are in need of repenting of our willful weaknesses in one of those areas. Along the way, we would do well to listen to one another in those areas where we do excel."